Good-Bye to London, Hello to Netherlands

I'm a little behind in my postings. This post covers:

• Friday, August 19 - Afternoon High Tea at the Dorchester Hotel, Selfridge's, Jazz Dinner Cruise on the Thames

• Saturday, August 20 - Fly to Amsterdam, pick up by Marius, Check into the Heavens Hotel, dinner at Marius and Anne-Marie's House

• Sunday, August 21 - With Anne-Marie and Marius, tour Van Gogh Museum and Rijks Museum, river cruise through Amsterdam, dinner at Moeder's

• Monday, August 22 - begin sailing, first stop Volendam

We were just having so much fun in London! But we had highly scheduled ourselves. We had less events scheduled on Friday, August 19. Since we had been up so late with our London friends the night before, we were glad we could sleep in a little bit and not miss out on anything. So we had a late breakfast and then made our way around the corner to the Dorchester Hotel for Afternoon High Tea!

These two unassuming Lamborghini's were parked outside the hotel:

The Afternoon tea is normally held in "The Promenade", but this is under renovation and will not reopen until October. Until then, Afternoon Tea is held in "The Orchid Room". As you walk in, you are greeted with the strong scent of roses which are grown on the premises. In fact, the hotel has its own variety of rose, appropriately called "The Dorchester".

The room was elegant and lovely in every way, and bursting with flowers.

The chandeliers were very impressive!

Along with our tea, we were served delicious finger sandwiches...

and delectable sweets:

We enjoyed this experience immensely!

We had some time to kill before our Jazz Dinner Cruise on the Thames, so we paid a visit to our favorite London department store: Selfridge's! We were able to get a taxi to drop us off there. Like Harrod's, they have a lovely candy department in the basement:

Selfridge's has a great "Tech" section in their basement, with the latest contraptions including compact TV projectors, motorized surfboards, mini electric cars, and foot massagers. One thing that surprised us: you can consult a psychic there!

We passed on that. When it was time to leave, we were unable to catch a taxi. It turns out that "The Tube" went on a one-day strike, and as a result, the taxi's were in high demand and almost impossible to get.

We did succeed in grabbing a taxi to get to our Jazz dinner cruise on the Thames. This was a fun affair. Though traffic was heavy, we boarded the boat in time and departed at 8:00 p.m. sharp. We spent time up on the roof of the boat first so that we could enjoy the views of the city before the sun set.

We saw the "Shard":

The extremely lovely Tower Bridge:

Details from the Tower Bridge:

The Tower of London:

Brock wore his jazz shirt for the occasion:

We went past downtown London, Canary Wharf, and up to Greenwich before the boat turned around and returned us to the Westminster Pier. I enjoyed my first "Pimm's":

I think it's a gin-based drink full of fruit.

It became a late night, because the cruise lasted 3 hours, and then we had to walk back to our hotel (because we could not flag a taxi). Brock's ailing foot (Plantar Fasciitis) had been doing better, but after all the walking we had to do today, he was lame again. We weren't in bed until midnight. Then we had to rise early to be ready to catch our 8:00 ride to the airport to make our flight to Amsterdam, which departed at 11:00 a.m.

All of that went very smoothly, and we arrived in Amsterdam on schedule on Saturday, August 20, at 1:30 p.m. We were picked up by our friend, Marius van Gijlswijk, and driven to his hometown of Hoorn. This is a really sweet small town near Amsterdam and right on the water. There are boats galore!

On the way to our hotel, a truck stopped to make a delivery and blocked the entire narrow road in front of us! Marius was forced to detour.

He dropped us off at our brand new hotel, the Heavens Hotel, located in a converted church. It was lovely.

Later, he and his wife, Anne-Marie, met us for drinks at a pub in town, where we enjoyed a sampling of traditional Dutch appetizers, all fried and delicious!

Then we walked with them to their nearby house for dinner. They live in a very small 800 square foot house right near the marina where they keep their boat. They're very happy there. This house is quite a contrast to their other house in Scottsdale, Arizona. That's where we met them.

Brock enjoying a drink on their back patio:

The view from the front of their house:

Marius grilled several different kinds of meat for us on the grill, all delicious:

We were all exhausted and slept well that night!

The next day, Sunday, August 21, we had plans to go see two museums in Amsterdam: the Van Gogh Museum and the Rijks Museum, which are very close together.

The Van Gogh Museum was relatively small. I particularly enjoyed his many self portraits. Brock observed that the only one he appeared to be happy in was the one portraying him as a painter.

After the first museum, we grabbed lunch outside in a very large food court and market area between the museums. I opted to order the hot dog which Chrissy Teigen declared was the best hot dog she had ever eaten, the "Junkyard Dog." It was topped with sauerkraut and salami and nestled in a sourdough bun. It is certainly the largest and most elaborate hot dog I have ever eaten!

Anne-Marie and Marius van Gijlswijk:

Jane and Brock:

Next up: the Rijks Museum, as beautiful on the outside as it is inside:

This is the hall where many paintings by Rembrandt are exhibited:

One of Brock's favorite paintings by Rembrandt is called "The Syndics":

This famous painting, called the "Night Watch", was huge! It required an elaborate system to be displayed.:

The Rijks Museum displayed a variety of things besides paintings: furniture, vases, swords, etc. I liked this armor:

When we got tired of traipsing through museums, we decided to tour the city of Amsterdam by boat! It turned out to be a great way to see the city:

This building has three swings on top! I am not sure I would have the nerve to sit in one of those swings!:

This is the Maritime Museum:

The Hermitage Museum:

Tall ships:

The Amstel Hotel, which (along with the Hotel L'Europa) is the place to stay if you are a celebrity:

The Rijks Museum looks really pretty from the water:

Now we were totally worn out!

It was time for dinner! We went to a traditional Dutch restaurant in Amsterdam called "Moeders", translated "Mother's". I had a very tasty Salmon with Hollandaise sauce and pumpkin soup. Anne-Marie told me that my meal was not traditional Dutch food. Ok! But it was still good.

That was all the excitement we could take for one day.

On Monday, August 22, we departed from Hoorn via Marius and Anne-Marie's sailboat!

On the walk to their house, I spotted this lego model of a dog in the front window of someone's home. This photo is not the best, due to the reflections off the glass, but you can see the muse for the model (the actual dog) to the left, inside the house. He was barking at me!:

Via Marius and Anne-Marie's 32 foot German sailboat (made in 2016) named "Ocotillo", our destination was Volendam. It took 4 hours, and we had good wind to start.

As we left Hoorn, I snapped this photo which shows 2 cruise ships docked in the harbor there. Our hotel, Heavens Hotel, is the steeple on the right. Another cruise ship was headed that way as we left:

Here we are in the Volendam Marina, which had exceptionally nice, clean facilities, and even a kiddie water park:

We got our bags out and prepared to walk to our hotel, the "Hotel Old Dutch".:

It was about a 15-minute walk to our hotel from the marina.:

This is the view from our room:

After Marius and Anne-Marie were kind enough to help us to our hotel, we had a drink at the hotel with them. Then, at Marius's insistence, we went next door to a place that took our photos in Dutch clothing. More on that later! We then let them return to their boat while we checked out the town some more.

We enjoyed this town very much; it reminded us of the island of Catalina in CA. We had to partake of a few of these waffles:

This is the Half Moon ship that sailed to New York City:

We enjoyed walking about the main road in town and popping in a few shops.

After a leisurely afternoon, we met Marius and Anne-Marie for dinner at our hotel. We enjoyed a very delicious and large serving of Mussels, along with some fish soup. After spending some time working on this post, we retired for the evening and slept like babies.